U.S. Refuses International Help with Oil Spill Cleanup

Over a year ago

by Lindsay Beyerstein

As of last Wednesday, 13 entities had offered assistance with the Gulf oil spill cleanup including Canada, Croatia, France, Germany, Ireland, Mexico, the Netherlands, Norway, Romania, Republic of Korea, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United Nations. The list offers came from a State Department email to the press corps. "These offers include experts in various aspects of oil spill impacts, research and technical expertise, booms, chemical oil dispersants, oil pumps, skimmers, and wildlife treatment," the email said. But yesterday, the State Department refused to tell reporters which countries had offered to help, Josh Rogin reports at The Cable.

A lot of these countries are world leaders in the oil industry. You'd think they might have some valuable expertise and state of the art gear to lend the U.S. in its hour of need. Nope. Evidently the Coast Guard has absolutely everything under control and doesn't need anybody's help with anything. The spill is on track to become the largest in human history, but the Coast Guard has it totally covered. Those pesky "other countries" need to butt out while the company that caused the spill figures out how to fix it.